Log mark found in lake relic of logging era

BAGLEY TWP. — History, at times, has a way of showing up in the unlikeliest of places — such as the bottom of a lake.

Jim Mink believes the waterlogged log he hauled out of Otsego Lake had been submerged for at least 80 years before it resurfaced last month and was spotted by his grandchildren.

“It was obvious it had been in the water a long time,” the Columbus, Ohio man said of his recent find. “It was a hazard to boaters and so I pulled it out and found it had some markings on it.”

An entry in the Otsego County Historical Society book “A Step Back in Time” indicates the saw-log might have been bobbing about in the water 100 years ago before it sank into the murky depths of Otsego Lake — about the time the last of the sawmills on the lake closed down after the area’s virgin timber had been logged off.

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According to an excerpt in the book, “Salling: A Vanished Village” — “Salling was located in the general area of Wah Wah Soo and Point Comfort” and “The village of Salling disappeared as the trees were logged off, and it had vanished by 1915.”

Mink said he found the recently surfaced log near his cottage on the northeast side of the lake, just north of what is now called Point Comfort, not far from one of the Salling sawmills during the heyday of the lumbering era. Mink said he has been coming to Otsego Lake for the past 60 years and “I’ve never seen anything like that.”

Why all the interest in a waterlogged log anyway? The answer lies in the letters stamped on the cut end of the log, indicating it had likely been cut during the lumbering area in Otsego County and was intended for one of the mills dotting Otsego Lake. History is often a matter of solving mysteries and Mink had an interest in discovering the origin of the log he found in the water near his cottage.

Mink sawed off an end of the log and took it in to the Historical Society Museum to see if he could learn anything more about the log’s markings.

“They couldn’t determine who made the mark,” which Mink described as a branding of the uppercase letters H, M, C, followed by a lowercase letter o. “It looked like it came from the HM Company, but we couldn’t find anything in the museum records to match it to a logging company or business.”

Historical Society volunteer Monte Ruble said she didn’t think the society had any books or pictures which showed the markings branded into logs to identify which of the many logging companies it may have belonged to. “It would be interesting to figure out what company the log had belonged to,” she said.

“I would imagine at one time the lake was filled with logs for the sawmills and this one just got away and eventually sank to the bottom,” Mink said. “What made this one float up after all these years is anyone’s guess.”

The logging era artifact is currently in the back room of the historical society museum, still drying out, and if anyone can shed some light on the log that hadn’t seen the light of day in many years — stop by the museum and talk to Ruble or one of the other staff members.